Darkness Falls and the Heavens Weep
by FantasyDeath
Summary: Lelouch is reborn as Uzumaki Naruto. Let's just say, people are gonna die. (Slash, AU, Crossover)
1. Chapter 1

**Darkness Falls and the Heavens Weep**

 **Summary:** Lelouch is reborn as Uzumaki Naruto. Let's just say, people are gonna die.

 **(WARNING! Slash, AU, Reincarnation, Sporadic Updates, OOC-Characters, Character Deaths)**

 **Disclaimer:** I do not own Naruto or Code Geass.

* * *

 **Chapter 1**

The memories came in bits and pieces.

It started slow, barely noticeable.

Naruto spent his time alone in his room in the orphanage, a drab dreary thing colored in monochrome with only a small window letting in light and releasing colors. The bed was made up of a futon on the ground, with only a thin ratty blanket to see him warm during the winter months. The lamp hanging from the ceiling didn't work after his first few months of life, and it was never replaced. There were a few toys scattered on the ground, presents from the old man that came to by see him every few weeks and a Goban in the corner, not something that would usually be given to a small child courtesy of the danger of choking on the stones.

The employees of the orphanage were rarely with him after he became independent enough that their presences weren't necessary. They left him alone in his room to entertain himself and, considering his circumstances, that things went the way they did was perhaps to be expected.

You see, the Kyuubi no Kitsune, a powerful demon made up of pure chakra, albeit malicious, was sealed in the soul of a newly born baby. A baby whose soul had not had much of a chance to solidify its bond with its new body. Naturally, this disrupted things. And perhaps, had that soul not been who they were, it wouldn't have mattered, but as they are, this is what happened.

So things started slowly, with the little things.

Naruto enjoyed playing with the Goban. He liked moving the stones around and creating problems for him to solve and he liked the fact that it was completely under his control. He wasn't sure why this was important, but he knew that he had control over nothing else in this place where he lived and so instead of questioning what his mind was telling him was fun, he made the most of it. He could distract himself for hours with it, creating strategies and even cheating against himself as he ran around the board, not yet strong enough to move it around on his own.

It wasn't so much that Naruto learned how to speak but rather that he remembered how, even if for a while he had a rather odd accent. While listening to the old man talking about his village and the unrest after the Kyuubi's attack, Naruto found himself nodding along as he wondered about the odd old words that people used. He paid attention to the way the old man spoke and did his best to mimic it, even if he could never quite get the old grandfatherly tone down. Although, that may have just been because he wasn't old.

When Naruto was three and the old man—who was apparently the Hokage, whatever that was?—decided he was mature enough, he moved out of the orphanage and into an apartment by himself. A helper came by once a week to drop off food and clean and do the laundry. The Hokage came by once every month and dropped off an envelope filled with the local currency and Naruto always dutifully hid it behind the mirror in the bathroom even if climbing the sink was always a precocious mission. Still, he was determined not to let anyone steal his money and he figured that that was a place most people would overlook.

His helper never stayed long, just enough to do their duty and every couple of months, they changed identity without him knowing why.

The Hokage—the only consistent person that he knew that had never treated him badly—left him things, toys to play with and books to read. But he was a busy man and so he never stayed longer then an hour and certainly not long enough to teach Naruto how to read.

Not that Naruto needed it.

The art of reading was a simple thing and the characters were like half-remembered pictures. Once he had a reason to remember them—to ease his boredom—he found them there in his mind and easy to access. The ones he didn't understand could be learned through context, and only the ones that were particularly difficult resulted in him asking the Hokage for help.

Most of the time, Naruto was content with this. This was what he grew up with, all that he had ever known and he didn't know how to want more. It wasn't like he was unhappy or desperately wanted to leave the apartment to explore the outdoors either. All in all, Naruto was a calm child that accepted what came to him and was prone to going with the flow. He didn't protest when he was told he was leaving the orphanage and he didn't protest when the Hokage informed him that he would be beginning at the Shinobi Academy in a few years time.

With the confirmation that Naruto had nothing against learning the ninja arts—how could he have anything against it when he didn't know what it was?—the Hokage started dropping off more books, these ones on the subjects he would be learning. There were books on chakra theory and applications, guidelines on diets and nutritions, history books detailing the history of Konohagakure no Sato, even if they were the kind where the winners were glorified heroes and the losers the inevitably defeated villains.

He was given maps containing the geography of the world he lived in and Naruto had a brief moment where he thought ' _a different world? Interesting'_ before his mind slipped on to other things. Things that would interest a small child more, even if he were a very mature one. Among the many things he were given, there were also weapons of rather good quality. There were kunai and shuriken and senbon and wires, and with them were scrolls detailing how to properly use them.

The Hokage helped him when he asked, correcting his grip when he was mistaken and keeping him from accidentally losing fingers. But with every visit, the man got more and more distant as he got busier and busier and from Naruto could piece together from the limited information he was offered, it had to do with unrest in the village concerning some of their own.

It brought to mind unpleasant images.

Before he could begin at the academy, Naruto got older. He grew taller and his baby fat gradually started to disappear, leaving behind a face that could be described as pretty rather than handsome, despite his young age. He devoured the books he was given, reading them again and again and mapping out timelines in his head and notes on paper where he wrote down anything that could be relevant. The chakra theory alone was fascinating.

He got into the habit of having a bowl of water next to him when he sat on the floor reading, keeping a hand over it and using chakra to pull small drops of water towards himself, just about an inch off of his hand. At the start, just getting the right amount of water was a problem and then to see it essentially floating in the air above his hand made him lose his concentration. At first, the water refused to do what he wanted and it was a pure exercise in frustration but then he thought of something. Water was flowing, something that was always in movement according to its own rules. Rather than pushing and pulling, maybe nudging would work better.

And it did.

Naruto learned how to nudge the water to make it _want_ to hover above his hand, instead of trying to force it and epically failing.

He learned how to move the drops of water around above his hand, never on them, and gradually he increased the amount of drops and created patterns with them. He learned how to divide his concentration until he could do it almost subconsciously with as little thought as possible. He switched which hands he used and taught himself to divide his attention to the point where he managed to read simultaneously.

He learned how to let his chakra seep out of his hands, visible as pale blue light and how to control the output until all that was left were thin threads that could only be half seen. The management of these threads were a delight to Naruto, they represented a new amusing way to use chakra that didn't require he reported his success to the Hokage, a man that he had never really trusted.

He had fun, twisting the threads into braids and creating nets with them. He taught himself to use them to lift up the stones on his Goban and using it to move them around.

Eventually, the time came when Naruto left his apartment to visit the outside world for the first time.

It was a disaster.

The world outside was loud and bright, with birds chirping in trees and people running on rooftops. The people were all smiles and laughs, loudly talking to each other about the latest gossip and inquiring about their health. The children ran on the streets playing games only they could be entertained by with adults milling around on the edges of them to keep them out of harms way. Konoha as a whole was a colorful place with many different people populating it. Somehow, it wasn't what Naruto had expected.

And then they caught sight of Naruto, long blond hair falling around his shoulders and dressed in an old threadbare orange jumpsuit, the only clothes he owned suitable for going outside. The whisker like marks on his cheeks made it impossible to mistake him for someone else.

Their attitude switched in the blink of an eye.

Suddenly, all their smiles were gone and in their places were scowls and furious frowns. The children were pulled reluctantly from the streets to go home, all the while loudly complaining to their parents that didn't pay them any mind. The previously kindhearted people glared and spit foul words, their hatred seeping out of their eyes. Naruto found himself rooted to the spot as his connection to the Kyuubi allowed him to sense all of the hatred and anger and desperate grief directed at him.

His shoulders dropped as he was assaulted from all sides with nothing but scorn and dislike and _rage_.

It made something in him wake up and take _notice_ , like when one hears a particularly tasteless joke.

Naruto's shoulders dropped a little more before he drew himself up to his full height, his bearing that of a royalty and his blue eyes looking down on everyone around him, as if they were the ants beneath his boots. He didn't spare them a glance as he continued on.

His wandering around Konoha brought him past a stand of delicious smelling food stall. Naruto blushed slightly when his stomach growled in reaction to the smell and made his way to it. He walked between the legs of adults who stepped away from him as if he was carrying a plague when they noticed him until he arrived in the stall. He climbed up and sat himself down on one of the chairs lining the counter and waited patiently for the cook to notice he was there. He wasn't about to announce his presence around people that disliked him with such a fervor.

Eventually, the cook realized he was sitting there and after a few seconds where they looked unsurely at him, they smiled and said, "Welcome! What can I get you?"

Naruto, grateful that this man wasn't seeped in hatred like the rest of the adults seemed to be, smiled genuinely at him and answered. "A big bowl of something delicious. It doesn't matter what it is."

"You got it!" the man smiled at him and made his ramen.

When Naruto tasted the ramen in the bowl in front of him, he had to admit, it was the most delicious tasting ramen he had ever eaten. And the man had smiled at him and done his best to ignore the whispers of _'traitor'_ that were being thrown around the stand by the few adults still left. Naruto pretended he didn't hear it, because it was undignified and it wasn't like their opinion of him mattered anyway.

That night, when he was home in his small apartment and alone again, Naruto thought about his new knowledge. For some reason, everyone hated him. When he tried to buy anything, he was overcharged to the point where it was a more of a robbery than purchase. And that was in the few stores that weren't mysteriously closed when he tried to enter them. The children paraphrased their parents and called him monster and demon to his face, in that way that children didn't know it was truly wrong and as they weren't discouraged by their family, they got the idea that it was acceptable and so continued to do it.

The thing was that Naruto could be loyal. He owed the Hokage a great deal and he recognized that and for perhaps that reason alone, he wasn't going to fight his destiny as a shinobi. But he wasn't the type to blindly give it to anyone who asked or was kind to him. If you wanted his loyalty, you had to earn it. And the people of this village—people that he would grow up to kill for so they weren't—spit on his name and blatantly hated him, spreading that hate to their children.

Naruto had no desire to die and fight for people that didn't appreciate it.

— —

Konoha was a military dictatorship that was slowly being more and more influenced by the desires of the civilians.

There was a civilian council that had control of the businesses and entertainment and civilian education. As more children from civilian families were accepted into the shinobi ranks, they spread their different morals and views of right and wrong, condemning anything that didn't agree with their parents teachings. Because they didn't grow up in shinobi clans, the reality of the shinobi life was often a shock and they usually ended up getting stuck as chuunin, because they just couldn't accept that becoming a jounin meant actually doing assassination missions from time to time. They found the practice of loving someone from the same gender to be unnatural and wrong and they spread this belief to the kids they grew up with and befriended.

With every passing year, the Hokage lost more and more of his grip on the village, due to both the machinations of the civilian and clan councils and the scheming of his former teammates.

The reality was that the Sandaime Hokage was tired and old and he had already retired once. His family was reduced to a small number after many different wars and his genin team were all gone to the wind, having left Konoha all but officially. The shinobi world was gearing up for another war, now that they were starting to recover from the last one. Ideally, someone else should have become Hokage and kept the village in their grasp and then maybe the feud with Uchiha wouldn't have spiraled so far out of control that he needed to spy on an entire clan of Konoha.

And it wasn't like all the blame laid on the Uchiha Clan either, the Hokage had waited for too long to address the rumors of their involvement in the Kyuubi's attack and the people had made up their minds. They wouldn't listen now even if he screamed the truth to the heavens, not that he was even sure what the truth was.

This was the times Uzumaki Naruto were born into. A time of unrest in their own home with a civil war an unavoidable result unless something drastic was done.

Naruto was eight when he finally started at the shinobi academy.

Like other aspects of the village since the civilians had gained more power, the academy had been simplified, the classes made gentler and easier to get by on theory alone to pacify the parents of the civilian children that went there. Some classes had been dropped entirely, deemed to difficult to understand and unnecessary for the children to know. This, of course, resulted in the mortality rate on the battlefield to go up significantly, as those without clans to help them were woefully unprepared for their chosen occupation.

But having a shinobi in the clan was a matter of pride and bragging rights, so no-one very much concerned themselves with that.

Naruto's class was filled with a mix of clan kids, civilians and orphans that didn't really have any other choice but to be ninjas. Their teacher was a young man named Umino Iruka that, although he reeked of fear and hatred alike, did his best to be fair to everyone and Naruto had to admit, he kind of admired the way Iruka-sensei could teach him just like any other child despite the dislike he felt for him. It was sort of inspiring, the way he could set aside his hatred in order to do his job.

Unfortunately, their other teachers had no such compunctions.

Naruto was sent out of class whenever an important subject came up, his tests were always returned full of red marks even when he knew for a fact that the answers were correct, his form when it came to taijutsu was always told to be wrong and in the end Naruto just plainly didn't listen to them and instead did his best to imitate the other students.

Humans liked to hate what they feared, which was why whenever he sensed people there was always an undercurrent of fear to their hatred and what they hated they wanted to destroy. For some reason, they couldn't attack him outright, so they had to settle for sabotaging his education and hoping he killed himself off due to ignorance. In short, they wanted to prove they were still better than him. They wanted to feel _superior_.

This was a wish that Naruto could fulfill.

The fact was that when you were around people you perceived to be stupid, you automatically thought yourself more dangerous than them, giving you an idiotic feeling of confidence because you could, theoretically, kill them before they killed you. So you stopped paying them so much attention and making sure they couldn't surpass you, because in your mind they simply _couldn't_.

Naruto was well versed in the art of wearing masks and the Mask of Stupid, as he called it, was child's play.

All he had to do was stop trying.

He doodled more on the test papers than he wrote on them, he didn't practice much of taijutsu at all, figuring that it would be better to learn it correctly later from his jounin-sensei when he became a genin then to gather bad habits that could get him killed. He spent more of his attention on chakra control exercises than the ninjutsu they were supposed to practice, because he found that he just had too much chakra to do them correctly without complete control over it. He disguised his traps and stealth training as pranks and practical jokes in order to find out what worked and what didn't in a controlled environment.

Slowly but surely, he improved and his grades didn't really move at all, because they had been bad from the very beginning. The only one that had bothered to grade him fairly was Iruka-sensei, but he didn't cover all the subjects so his grades couldn't save the rest of them.

By the time Naruto was ten, he was known as the dead last of his class.

The massacre of the entirety of the Uchiha Clan save a boy in his class that he didn't pay much focus to didn't really garner much of his attention. It happened in the span of a single night and while Naruto was impressed with the capabilities of the one who offed them, it wasn't something that directly affected his life. Well, much.

The Uchiha had made up the entire police force, they had dealt with all the civilian crimes and many shinobi ones as well. And the thing was, they were good at their jobs. As much as people mistrusted them, with their loss they found out exactly how much they had contributed to the catching of murders and rapists and other unspeakable criminals. With their deaths, the ANBU was redirected to take over their duties, a giant mistake if he ever saw one.

The ANBU were the elite, the best of the best, but they hid behind masks that let nothing show. And sure, they were useful for protecting their identities, but they sucked at inspiring faith in people. The emotionless masks and lack of an actual name meant that not many civilians were brave enough to report crimes to them, because what if they were the ones who committed them?

They also had the annoying tendency to think civilians to be harmless and deny that a civilian could have committed a violent crime.

Quite frankly, all they did was annoy him.

And so time moved on. The Uchiha in his class—the last Uchiha in the village—became a gloomy boy that only ever trained and looked down on everyone around him. The fangirls that always followed him around increased in numbers and Naruto very carefully made sure he was never within breathing distance of the Uchiha, as he had no desire to incur the wrath of a group of rabid females.

Naruto continued to be excluded from class as the years went by, but it wasn't something he mourned, the learning of the Henge meaning that he could walk right into the public library of Konoha, something he had never been able to do before.

He took advantage of this by spending most of his time in the library and reading up on any subject that caught his eye. While the shinobi department of the library was off-limits to him (except the ones geared towards academy students) as you needed special identification that you only got after you officially became a genin to get in and there was always a guard around to make sure no-one snuck in, that didn't mean that there weren't fascinating subjects otherwise. All things that dealt with chakra techniques were books he couldn't touch, but chakra wasn't the be all end all.

There was an impressive collection on poisons and herbs and teas in the library just gathering dust in the corner and with his advanced healing abilities and the fact that poison didn't affect him at all, it seemed like a good way to pass the time. At the very least, learning the antidotes and to identify the different poisons was always a good idea. Who knew, it might his future teammates life at some point.

Not to mention, it was a very good ace to have up your sleeve.

Naruto was of the opinion that always having four or five tricks up your sleeve was just common sense and he didn't see how anyone could argue otherwise.

He'd long since given up on the idea of fighting fair.

Eventually, Naruto turned twelve and it was time to graduate.

Naruto had already tried the graduation test twice for the last two years and he'd failed epically both times, mostly because he just didn't enough control to use the clone technique. He could manage the Kawarimi and Henge, but when it came to the Bunshin, they just looked dead and deflated. He'd tried spamming the room with them the last time, which had made them look less dead but he'd been denied because he'd apparently defied his orders by doing so, as the goal was to make _one_ successful clone.

But Naruto was well aware that for some reason the Hokage was very much invested in him becoming a shinobi and he didn't doubt that if he failed this time as well—you only had three tries after all—the Hokage would find some kind of loophole to be able to advance him. He was considering failing on purpose just to find out what that loophole would be.

It was always a good idea to know loopholes in the law, after all.

The day of graduation dawned quietly. The sun was shining, birds were chirping and Naruto was—as he'd made a habit of being, because the teachers were always less likely to pay attention to him when they had a legitimate excuse to mess with his education—late again. He arrived running through the door more than half-an-hour later than he was supposed to and he could see the vicious satisfaction on Mizuki's face. Considering the fact that Mizuki had never taught him a single thing, Naruto wasn't about to call him sensei.

The other students in his class were all different degrees of nervous. The clan heirs (and there were quiet a lot of them) were all calm and composed as they knew they would graduate. The civilians were rereading all heir books and repeating things they had learned recently to make sure they remembered it for the written test that made up about sixty percent of the final test for graduation. This way, even if the civilians sucked on the physical applications, they could graduate with decent results based entirely on theoretical knowledge.

Again, this was another way thing that would result in former civilians dying faster.

The orphans, the ones that were desperate and had nowhere else to go, that had trained until their bodies broke down because they wouldn't get chosen unless they were the absolute best, were all trying to keep calm, because at this point there was nothing more that could be done. If they didn't manage to graduate, they had two more chances (the ones that weren't already repeating that is) and two more years to get better, but they all knew that they probably wouldn't get any further than chuunin even if they did. Orphans had nothing to fall back on if the shinobi thing didn't work out, as they had no means of getting any other education—the shinobi academy was free but all others schools cost money to enroll in, money the orphans simply didn't have—so they were all varying degrees of desperate.

During his years at the academy, Naruto had barely had any contact with the clan children. Occasionally he and Kiba had teamed up on pranks, sometimes even Shikamaru tagged along, but that was the extent of it. He sat nest to Aburame Shino in class, as the other boy was quiet and never said anything stupid, which was more than could be said for almost everyone else.

But aside from that, Naruto had barely spoken a word to any clan children. He had had even less contact with the civilians as they were always influenced by their parents and peer pressure to hate him and ridicule him. He was, on the other had, on amicable terms with most of the orphans as they had the lack of parents or family in common and due to both the various wars and the Kyuubi's attack there were many orphans, the employees of the orphanages couldn't turn everyone against him. Not to mention, orphans in Konoha were so numerous that the vast majority of them were independent—there just weren't enough room in the orphanages—and they weren't about to be manipulated by adults that couldn't care less about them. It was a matter of principle.

When his name was called by Iruka-sensei, after finishing all other tests including the written ones (which he already knew he failed) and the physical ones, he left the classroom behind and entered another one next door.

In it Mizuki was waiting with a smug smile.

Naruto narrowed his eyes in suspicion but didn't remark on it. There was no point as MIzuki was both Iruka's assistant and friend.

"Alright, Naruto-kun the final test is to perform the Bunshin successfully." Iruka-sensei said as he stood next to table that held a bunch of forehead protectors.

As soon as he finished talking, Naruto was already sure he would fail and he let out a sigh. Well, this just meant that he could see what the Hokage's reaction would be to him not succeeding. He was, admittedly, curious about it.

He took a deep breath, made sure that he had a good grip on his chakra and made the hand seals.

The clone that appeared was colorless, flopping to the ground almost instantly and just looked very much _not_ alive. It was a decent image of Naruto at least, but he doubted that mattered much.

When he looked up, it was to see Iruka-sensei actually look disappointed, as f he had been expecting something else and Naruto was stunned to realize that he actually felt _bad_ about disappointing the only person in the world that had ever tried to teach him. It was the shock of this realization—that Iruka-sensei actually mattered to him somehow—that meant he wasn't paying much attention to how Mizuki tried to argue for him. Oh, he knew very well it was a trap of some kind, Mizuki had hated him since day one, but he was confident in his ability to beat Mizuki if it came to that.

No, what had his attention was the way that Iruka-sensei looked, like somehow he'd been proven wrong.

It kind of… _hurt_.

At the end of it all, Naruto left the classroom without a hitai-ate and with a strange sense of guilt in his stomach.

He didn't like it.

— —

"I'll let you in on a big secret."

"If you can get the Forbidden Scroll from the Hokage Tower and learn one of the techniques that is written there, you can graduate anyway."

"It's a secret test, so remember not to tell anyone."

"So, what do you say, Naruto-kun, do you want to become a real shinobi?"

Naruto leaned back on the branch he was sitting on and kept a tight grip of the large scroll in his hands. Down on the ground, almost directly below, a Kage Bunshin was pretending to be him. He'd made sure to overload so it could make clones as well, a trick he'd learned while he played around with the technique. While it wouldn't last long while it was overloaded on charka, it would be able to get rid of some of that chakra by making clones as well and lasting longer. More importantly, it would help sell the trick that the clone was the real him while the other clones hidden in the forest copied the scroll.

All of the clones were in the forest to make sure that even if they gathered a sensor, they would all claim he was here. He didn't yet know how to hide his chakra, after all.

Once whatever trap there was had been sprung, he'd need to be quick about switching with the clone to make sure no-one figured out exactly how long he'd had the scroll.

It had been easy to steal.

All Naruto had to do was walk into the Hokage Tower like he belonged, while henge'd to look like an unremarkable (but not too unremarkable, that would be seen through) person of low—but high enough—ninja standing. He'd made sure he didn't have any identifying markers and to limp while he walked to have an excuse available if someone wondered why they hadn't seen him on the field. He'd looked to have been a little above average height and his eyes had been a dark blue color while his hair had been sandy brown.

Then all he had to do was to slowly make his way to where the Forbidden Scroll was hidden while looking like he knew exactly where he was going, which he admittedly did.

In the end, he'd stolen it in broad daylight and left a copy in its place. After all, when you cloned yourself, everything you wore were also copied, including a certain scroll tied to your back.

This was the copy his Kage Bunshin had later stolen right in front of the Hokage's sight to get their attention on whatever Mizuki had planned, if—for some unforeseen reason—Naruto messed up and couldn't get out of the trap himself. Having a back-up plan or five was just common sense.

When he could hear evidence of someone else getting closer, he henge'd himself and the scroll into two squirrels and sat back to enjoy the show.

Mizuki bludgeoned into the clearing his clone was in with all the grace of a boar.

The taunts were unwelcome but not a surprise. What was, however, was when Iruka-sensei emerged as well and started to fight his fellow leaf ninja.

Then came a sentence that explained everything.

"You're the Kyuubi no Kitsune!"

"You killed Iruka's parents!"

"It's all your fault!"

 _"Just die, demon!"_

Both Naruto and his clone were stunned by surprise and the many things it explained. The stares, the hatred, the _fear._

 _It explained it all._

The next sequence of events would be ingrained in his memory for the rest of his life.

Iruka-sensei risked his life to protect Naruto's. He risked his life to protect Naruto's _clone_. He took a giant shuriken to his back and still manage to smile and tell him he was his precious student.

The rage he felt almost drowned him.

Naruto watched as his clone erupted in anger, summing as many clones as its chakra would allow, until there was nothing left for the clone itself and it poofed out of existence. Naruto didn't waste any time, he jumped down from the tree and once on the ground, together with the scroll in his hands, he let the henge go. He stared, satisfied, as Mizuki was crushed by dozens of clones, the burning rage only calming when Mizuki's heartbeat finally stopped.

Naruto waited for a few more minutes, listening closely, before he finally calmed down enough to go an check on Iruka-sensei. He could still hear his heartbeat so he knew was alive, but coma or something else was still a very real possibility.

Iruka-sensei opened his eyes when he sensed that Naruto was near and Naruto was, once again, stunned when he saw the tired but undoubtedly _warm_ smile on his face. Naruto felt himself smile in return, his first real smile in years, before he knew what he was doing.

"Come here Naruto, I've got a surprise for you. Close your eyes."

Naruto closed his eyes just enough, he didn't trust anyone not to stab him in the back, a feeling that had only grown over the years, but thankfully Iruka did't seem to notice. He stared at Iruka as he took off his forehead protector and felt his breath catch when he felt him put it on him.

Oh, it wasn't because he was finally a shinobi. That was utterly inconsequential.

But, it did feel kind of good to know that there was someone who didn't think him entirely useless.

When he opened his eyes to gaze at Iruka-sensei again, the smile that lit up his face was unconditionally _real._

Behind him, the sound of ninjas arriving spooked the forest and Naruto was bombarded with the memories of the clones in the forest as they all popped, one after one, after they had careful hidden the copies where none but him would find them. A medic came forward to take Iruka-sensei away and Naruto watched him until he was out of his sight as the Hokage put a hand on his shoulder and smiled proudly down at him.

 _Well, this ninja thing could be interesting, I suppose._

 _Such a shame Suzaku isn't here._


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

The following morning, Naruto lazed about in bed for hours before he left it.

They had a week before they would be back at the academy to get their team assignments and Naruto intended to make the most of it.

The night before, after the entire episode with Mizuki—who the Hokage had refused to talk about—and Iruka-sensei getting injured, the Hokage had kept him at his office for almost an hour as he repeatedly explained to him that he wasn't the Kyuubi, he was just its container.

It wasn't that he didn't understand what the Hokage meant, he'd read about fuuinjutsu enough to know that the scroll and the sealed object were two different things. He'd just never bothered to deepen his understanding of the subject, something he now realized was an oversight if one could use it to trap demons.

He had a lot of things he still needed to learn, it seemed.

Naruto finally left the bed just after noon, changing into the clothes he normally wore when he used the henge to visit the library. The clothes were admittedly stolen as his only other pair was the orange jumpsuit and that would be a dead give away so he hadn't had the opportunity to buy any. But they were generic enough that no-one could claim them without reasonable doubt and Naruto only ever wore them when he used the disguise for business he couldn't get done looking like himself. He didn't doubt that if he hadn't learned the henge, he would have been even more malnourished than he already was.

As it was, years of poor quality food that were almost always past its date had already taken its toll and he was one of the shortest in his class.

The clothes he changed into were a pair of standard black shinobi pants and a black short-sleeved shirt with a grey jacket over it. They were big enough that when he added a few centimeters to his height (just enough so that he was about average, if a little below it) the clothes fit perfectly. His hair color switched to black with just a thought and he added some more length to it before he brushed his hands through it and twisted it up into a high ponytail. He was already pale enough from staying inside and practicing more at night than he did during the day and without the whisker-like marks on his cheeks, his face was nearly unrecognizable.

His eyes shifted to a pale icy-blue color that reminded him of frost, as an forgettable color would just add suspicion he didn't need. After all, the people that manned the library were chuunins.

But he had been using this disguise for over two years, so he was fairly confident in it.

Still, it never hurt to be cautious.

The forehead protector that Iruka-sensei had given him looked used, as it was his old one and Naruto only hesitated for a few seconds before he fastened it around his waist. He had been starting to think that the librarian was beginning to suspect him as he played at being a shinobi but never wore an hitai-ate. This would hopefully fix that issue.

After eating a healthy breakfast and making sure that everything was locked, he left his apartment through the window and took to the rooftops.

He took a detour through the shopping district before he dropped to the ground to make sure he wouldn't be traced back to his apartment on the off chance that he was caught. Really though, the fact that he hadn't been said something about the village security.

Well, it wasn't any of his business.

The library in Konoha was big, with two floors and shelves after shelves. There were tables strategically placed to study at and comfortable couches. According to Iruka-sensei, it had been built by the Nidaime Hokage. It was also one of Naruto's favorite places to go as knowledge was power.

He passed by the front desk and nodded to the chuunin on duty, getting a smile and a nod in response.

"I'll write you down on the registry, Tachibana-san."

He smiled politely at the chuunin, "Thank you."

He swept passed the rest of the shelves on his way to the section on fuuinjutsu that he could access. Strangely, this one wasn't as tightly regulated as the rest of the library, probably because Konoha's only seal master at the moment was Jiraiya of the Sannin—who was rarely, if ever, actually in Konoha—and they wanted to encourage more to study the subject by making it easier to access. Not to mention that it was also an notoriously difficult subject that was almost impossible to ever actually master.

Naruto was only looking for the basics though.

The books were all old yellowing things with the covers worn off and torn pages. The scrolls were hardly any better, being both older and more well used. It looked like nothing new had been added in ages.

He go the persistent feeling that just touching one of them would make them utterly fall apart.

Naruto spent a few minutes just trying to read whatever titles he could make out before he gave up and just grabbed whatever he could get his hands on and made his way to one of those study tables, one located in a corner out of sight for anyone not deliberately looking for it.

He spread out his load on the table and settled in for the long haul.

— —

Several hours later and Naruto was ready to tear his hair out in frustration.

 _The texts disagreed._

Some said that the numerous symbols and figures one used in fuuinjutsu were symbolic, others said that there were very specific rules and breaking them resulted in either explosions or nothing, no in between. Some claimed them to be like a language and others that they didn't matter at all and it was all a matter of belief. Naruto didn't know which texts he wanted to burn the most. All of them were equally _useless._

Naruto scowled down at the various papers scattered on the table in front of him and fought with the urge to tear them all to pieces.

Staying in the library and getting irritated over it wasn't a good idea, so Naruto packed up and put the more useless ones back where he found them on the shelves. The rest he gathered in his arms and started to make his way through the library to the front desk where he could register them and bring them home with him. Not being worried about getting caught would lead him to being able to think clearer and than he might actually start getting somewhere. He was starting to understand why they put so much emphasis on seal masters if this was why it was so difficult. He would have to go through everything with a fine comb and try to differ the actual facts from conjectures and theories.

It was going to be a pain.

When he got to the front desk, there was another chuunin there than before (he'd been here longer than he thought) but he didn't allow himself to hesitate. That would only bring unnecessary attention. Instead, he put his load down on the desk and fished out his library card from his pocket.

The chuunin looked at the massive pile of books and scrolls, so high Naruto could barely see over it, and asked, "Name?"

"Tachibana Mikio." he'd been through the process enough time that he fired off the name without thinking. He didn't bother stating his thought up rank, as it was better to let them draw conclusions themselves. It saved him from having to lie about it and if he was caught, he could say the truth. _That he had never claimed such a thing. That they had made it up on their own._

The chuunin nodded and grabbed the card when it was offered. Apparently, they were bored enough that they felt the need to make conversation with Naruto and he did his best not to tell lies, as that would just be more things he would need to remember. Bending the truth was easier.

"These are all about the sealing arts." the chuunin quirked an eyebrow in question and Naruto nodded in response.

They continued, "Is it something someone your age should be learning?"

Naruto couldn't quite stop himself from grimacing. He had never been able to figure out his exact age. There was just something that rang _false_ in his head when he said he was twelve. In the end all he said was, "Age can be deceiving."

The chuunin nodded, smiled politely and gave the card back. "You're finished. They need to be back within three months. If you want, you can extend the loan then."

"Thank you." Naruto nodded one last time to the chuunin, made an effort to smile somewhat pleasantly and collected his load again.

(Sometimes he just couldn't quite suppress his desire to kill.)

(It was a work in progress.)

— —

The next few days passed by quickly. He spent his time making two or three clones a day to study fuuinjutsu while he worked on building up his stamina and strength. He only had a week until team assignments and he thought if whoever was watching him—because in a shinobi village, it was best to assume someone always was—got used to him being outside in rarely used places, they wouldn't find anything odd when he eventually went to retrieve the Forbidden Scroll where it was hidden.

The scroll was hidden deep in the forest where the fiasco with Mizuki had taken place and Naruto had waited for days before he felt safe enough to venture in there again. Sure, it wasn't the real scroll, that had been given back to the Hokage, but it was about five different copies that his shadow clones had worked on together. If he put them together, they should be just as good as the real thing.

To be safe, he sent a shadow clone in the direction of an unused training ground and waited for almost an hour before he left his apartment as the sun started to set.

He made sure to take a few detours and make it seem like he was walking around aimlessly. Eventually, Naruto made it to the forest and started searching for the tree-trunk in which the scrolls were hidden. It took him some time to find it and by the time he finally had the scrolls in his hands, it was night and dark. It didn't help that the trees were close enough that barely any moonlight made it to the ground. Naruto didn't waste any time, he pulled out the small piece of paper he had hidden in his pocket and laid it on the ground. Next, he brought his scrolls over to it and held it over the storage seal in the middle of the paper and channeled his chakra into it like he'd practiced. It lit up briefly and then the scrolls were gone, leaving only the paper behind.

Naruto smiled proudly to himself.

He grabbed the paper and hid it again and then climbed up among the trees to hurry back home. He ran across the rooftop for a while before he dropped back to the ground and walked the last bit of distance to the apartment. As he walked, he got the memories of his clone as it dispelled and grinned when he discovered that it had been followed. Most likely, this meant that no-one had paid any attention to his little trip to the forest.

He entered the apartment through the door this time and once again wondered at the fact that he had no neighbors. He was the only one living on his floor, though there were a few people downstairs, but he rarely, if ever, saw them. Well, now he knew that it was likely because of the Kyuubi, which while it was an acceptable excuse, didn't actually make him feel any more forgiving than before.

That wasn't to say that Naruto was going to go after revenge deliberately. He knew what that would result in, misery and despair.

But death and torture wasn't the only way to get back at those who'd wronged him.

For now, he'd take things as they came and see where it led him. If he got a good opportunity, he might take it or he might not. It all depended on how things played out.

(If he occasionally burned with rage at the insolence people treated him with, that was no-ones business but his own.)

The apartment was just as he left it, three clones spread out all over it working on sealing.

Naruto closed and locked the door behind him and ventured over to the dining table in the small kitchen. He was too tired to deal with it at the moment, so after a minute of contemplating, he summoned another clone. This one was just like all the rest, a perfect copy of him that when dispelled would transfer its memories to him so he'd know anything it knew, learn anything it learned and experience anything it experienced.

The one who invented the Kage no Jutsu was a genius.

— —

A week had passed since graduation and they were going to be assigned their teams.

Naruto thought long and hard on what he would wear, but eventually decided that he could ditch the jumpsuit once he had made some money from missions and just wear it until then. He didn't want to risk anyone—however slim the chance was—recognizing the clothes he wore when he was as Tachibana. He'd hacked his hair off just below his shoulders a few days back with a kunai, leaving it slightly uneven, but it still looked well enough to pass. After making sure that he hadn't forgotten anything, and had brought a few cups of instant ramen in case he became hungry with him in a sealing scroll, he locked his apartment up and left through the window.

The academy was loud when he arrived. It was full of needlessly proud kids that bragged about the fact that they had all passed, as if becoming a murderer was something to be pleased about, and parents that were too nosy for their stations. Naruto found his way to his classroom and settled down beside the ever-quiet Aburame kid.

Soon after, Iruka-sensei entered the room and held a speech. After that, it was time for the revealing of the teams. Naruto kept a mental list of all the names and teams to write down later, as there was no telling when such information could be important. It was better to have it and not need it, than to need it and not have it. Eventually, his name came up as a member of team seven, together with Haruno Sakura and Uchiha Sasuke.

After that, it was just waiting.

It took hours for the jounin sensei to arrive and when he did, all of them were out of patience. Naruto had spent the time studying up on fuuinjutsu, but his team-members hadn't had such foresight and were thus bored out of the minds. When their sensei opened the door, the first thing they saw was the silver hair that stuck up in all directions, the mask that covered the majority of his face and the headband that robbed him of an eye. Naruto sealed away the scroll he had been attempting to make sense of and stood up.

Their sensei stared out at all of them and said, in a bored and monotone voice, "Well, you're no fun at all."

Naruto didn't react.

He had long since learned that taunting and other such things were useless, and there was never a point disagreeing with them. That just riled people up further and before you knew it, it escalated to the point of all out war.

Their sensei continued with, "Follow me to the roof."

As they were the last ones in the classroom, hell Naruto was willing to bet they were the last one in the entire academy, there was no logical reason to move location other than that their new sensei was messing with them, but he didn't bother to argue. He needed to figure out exactly how useful their sensei was going to be, so he would go along with this for now.

That didn't mean it didn't rub him the wrong way and he lost whatever shred of respect he had managed to retain of their sensei. If he wasn't going to seriously train them, Naruto would either have to find a way to make him, or find someone else to train him. He wasn't going to waste time waiting for their sensei to grow up.

At the roof, their sensei was waiting, looking needlessly cool. It served no purpose other than bragging and Naruto didn't care for it. He sat himself down beside the Uchiha, because he had no idea what he'd done to make Haruno dislike him, but she was way to free with her punches and if she kept it up, he was going to kill her one of these days. Haruno sat down on the other side of Uchiha, her crush dictating her actions to a pathetically predictable degree.

Their sensei smiled with his one visible eye and said, "Well, why don't we introduce ourselves? Get to know each other? Likes, dislikes, the works."

Haruno put up her hand as if they were still in class. She had a lot of habits she needed to get rid of if she wanted to be a true shinobi. "Can you go first, sensei? So we know how to do it?"

Their sensei hummed in thought and shrugged. "Why not? My name is Hatake Kakashi. I like a lot of things, dislikes even more and my dream is none of your business. Now you, pinky."

"Oh." Haruno looked down to the floor in embarrassment. "I like... I mean my dream is... I dislike Naruto!"

Considering where her eyes kept going, it was pretty clear what she liked and what her dream was. Hatake gave her a weird look and gestured for Uchiha to go ahead. "My name is Uchiha Sasuke. I don't having anything I like. I dislike a lot of things. My dream, no my ambition, is to kill a certain man and restore my clan."

Well, wasn't that depressing?

Naruto continued when their sensei's eye traveled to him. "I'm Uzumaki Naruto. I like reading, Go and training my chakra control. I dislike hypocrites and liars and my dream is to not destroy the world."

Naruto had done a lot of thinking. He had analyzed his powers, the villagers reaction to him and after the revelation of what he was, what he contained, he had come to the conclusion that destroying the world would not only be easy, but that he almost wanted to. He had nothing that actually tied him to the this world, nothing he wished to protect or even have for himself. To him, this world didn't matter.

It wasn't spite talking, because when he was spiteful, it was an entirely different picture. No, it was just indifference.

He truly didn't care.

This world was like a game to him.

But he knew that he had tried the whole taking over the world thing before and he liked to think he didn't repeat mistakes. Maybe he didn't know exactly _when_ or _how_ he had tried it, but he knew that he had. And he knew it hadn't lead to anything good for him. The world may have been better for it (common enemies did that) but it hadn't been for him.

(Maybe it was selfish of him, but for once in his life, he wanted something that was solely his. He wanted happiness that no-one could take from him.)

(He wanted a love that would never die.)

Hatake cleared his throat and said, "Well, now that we've introduced ourselves, it's time for out first survival training!"

Haruno put her hand up in the air again, making Naruto have the vivid picture of cutting it off before he managed to push it away. "But, sensei, we've already done a lot of survival training at the academy."

At this, Hatake chuckled at them with mock in his one visible eye. "It won't be your typical training. You'll have to survive against me."

"So, what kind of practice will it be?" Haruno asked, sounding unsure of herself.

"If I told you, you'd chicken out." Hatake claimed with a laugh and continued, "Of the twenty-seven members of your graduation class, only nine will be accepted as genin. The other eighteen will have to go back for additional training. This test has a sixty-six percent failure rate!"

Naruto's eyes widened in surprise. He had researched enough to know that Konoha has a strict three per team policy, especially when it comes to genin, which meant that whether they passed or not, they would do so as a team. Most likely, it was enough for one of them to fail, and they'd all have to go back. The most probable scenario was a team test that focused on if they could work together or not, which they would also probably fail.

Haruno hated him for some reason, she'd never work together with him, not unless Uchiha told her too. And Uchiha was completely self-absorbed and thought that he had to take on everything alone. Naruto didn't know what it was about, but he thought it was less about looking down on others and more just not trusting them. Which would be just as much of a problem. In order for them to pass, they'd have to manage some sort of team effort and display potential that would make it worth it even if they didn't manage enough.

Then again, it was entirely possible that it was unnecessary.

Uchiha Sasuke was the last of two Uchiha, and the only one in Konoha. He had the potential—pretty much guaranteed, considering he was the son of the former Clan Head and the younger brother of an absolute genius—to awaken the legendary Sharingan and the training from his family that meant he was already considered a valuable asset, whether he had graduated yet or not. Not to mention the weight alone the Uchiha name carried, the reputation it had. Konoha must have taken a huge hit when they lost that weight and be despaired to restore it. So, Uchiha Sasuke would likely pass the test regardless, the question was whether Naruto and Haruno would pass with him. Naruto wouldn't put it past the Hokage to make an exception and allow him to be a one-man team.

Naruto may hold no respect for Hatake as a teacher, but he knew who he was. Copy-nin Kakashi, the man with a thousand jutsu. He was a formidable enemy and ninja. Doubtlessly, the Council wanted him to teach Uchiha regardless of his own wishes, which might be partly to blame for his bad attitude. It did, however, not even begin to excuse it.

Being a shinobi was—without a shadow of a doubt—a dangerous occupation. The lessons they learned from their jounin-sensei would be vital. If Hatake didn't teach them seriously because he was being obnoxious on purpose, it could very well lead to their deaths. Unless he manned up, he would be more of a danger to them than their actual enemies. And Naruto had no patience to spare for people who were difficult just to be difficult.

And then, of course, there was his own case to consider.

Naruto contained the Kyuubi no Kitsune, the most powerful of the tailed beasts. Theoretically speaking, he could probably access that power. Otherwise, people wouldn't be so stubborn with their fear of him, if they didn't already know he could use it if he ever set his mind to it. Oh, they would probably still hate him, but their fear wouldn't be nearly so heady.

And this was a ninja village, the good of the village was above all. Ergo, it wasn't a stretch to imagine that it was on purpose that he would be able to use this inhuman power. In fact, he was willing to bet that that was what the Hokage counted on.

In short, Naruto had a weapon of mass destruction, and only he had the launch codes.

And only he could aim it.

It was a sweet piece of irony.

Konoha hated him, and Naruto knew it. The villagers would rather spit on his corpse than let him buy food, the shinobi never _ever_ spared him so much as a glance, despite the fact that they _must_ know how a seal worked, and even he knew it was odd how much attention the Hokage personally paid him. So Naruto was meant to be a weapon and he was meant to use it for Konoha if they ever went to war again—which, let's be real, they were going to—and yet nearly no-one had ever paid him so much as a kind word.

 _Why_ , in the name of whatever god they believed in, did they think he would _ever_ fight for them?

But Naruto wasn't about to let anyone figure out his thoughts just yet, it would be much more entertaining as a surprise, and so he stopped thinking about that and returned to the present just in time to hear whatever Hatake said next.

"The test will take place first thing in the morning. Meet me at training ground three at seven in the morning. And don't eat any breakfast!"

After saying the last sentence, Hatake made a simple hand-seal and disappeared in a crowd of leaves.

Naruto narrowed his eyes and immediately decided that Hatake wasn't to be trusted and that thus, he wouldn't heed his warning. Naruto had had his trust broken too many times for it to ever be given for free. The only person in this world that he trusted was Iruka, and even that was a fragile, easily broken thing.

— —

The next morning, he woke up early in order to eat a full breakfast and pack a bag full of things to distract him in case Hatake was late again. He packed a few lunch-boxes as well, because if he knew Haruno at all, she was going to do as Hatake had said and not eat anything. And considering the diet she was already on, that meant she was half-starving herself, it just wasn't healthy. And Uchiha... well, it probably wouldn't hurt to make an effort at least. It might count towards the team test.

Hopefully.

He arrived on time, because there was a chance that Hatake would be on time as well, and settled down on the hard ground. He was the first one there and Naruto cracked open a book on sealing to make use of the time. Barely ten minutes later, both Haruno and Uchiha arrived as well and sat back to wait.

Hours passed.

By the time Hatake actually arrived, it was eleven in the morning and they had been waiting for hours, during which Haruno had fallen asleep and Uchiha had started meditating. Naruto's opinion of their jounin-sensei didn't rise.

Hatake appeared in a swirl of leaves that woke up Haruno, who then proceeded to point and shout, "You're late!"

"Ah, well you see, a black cat crossed my path and I had to take the long way around. And then I met a little old lady that I had to help across the street and she wouldn't let me leave until I followed her all the way to her home for cookies." Hatake lied without remorse.

Naruto put away the book in his bag together with the notebook he had been scribbling ideas and theories in. Hatake stared them all down and held up a pair of strings that were connected with two bells for them to see. Hatake explained, "The test is to get these bells form me. If you get them before the time limit, you pass. If you don't, then it's back to the academy for you!"

Haruno put her hand up in the air again. Someone really needed to fix that habit of hers. "But, sensei, there are only two bells?"

Even without being able to see his face, it was easy to tell that Hatake was smiling at them. "Yes. The one who doesn't get a bell loses and goes back to the academy. The time limit is twelve o'clock. Come at me with the intent to kill."

With that, Hatake put a clock on one of the tree-stumps in the middle of the training grounds.

"When the bell rings, the time is up!" Hatake exclaimed.

Naruto didn't wait another second to disappear into the trees. He needed to find his teammates and see if he could convince them to work together. And now, in hindsight, he realized he could have used the time waiting to convince them instead of just ignoring them. Evidently, he was losing his touch. But he couldn't fix that now and so instead he went on a search. He found Haruno first, which wasn't a surprise, she might be good at the theory, but she sucked at the practical component. Naruto barely spared her a glance before he moved on.

For whatever reason, Haruno hated him. She wasn't going to work with him unless Uchiha was, so even trying to convince her otherwise would just be a waste of precious time. They only had an hour, after all.

Jumping from tree to tree, he attempted the follow the trace of Uchiha's chakra that he could feel. Naruto wouldn't call himself a sensor exactly, because that wasn't what he could do. But he could sense emotions and after spending years in the same class as the Uchiha, he knew very well what he felt like. Uchiha was full of rage and hatred and _pain_ , together with a loneliness so deep, Naruto didn't think it would ever disappear.

And Naruto knew very well where those emotions came from.

Uchiha itachi was very well known in Konoha, after all, and almost as hated as Naruto. Of course, at one point, he had also been seen as Konoha's hope and genius and Naruto had even thought he might end up being the next Hokage some day. He certainly had what it took.

But then he had slaughtered the entirety of his own clan, elderly, children and even his parents included. The only one that seemed to have escaped his madness was Sasuke, his younger brother. And even that was an unsure thing, because Sasuke had certainly not been the same after that. Naruto could very well remember the way he had looked at the world the first few months after his clans death. Like he couldn't see it.

Like he was the only one in the world.

That kind of trauma was obviously going to change a person and to be honest, Naruto thought he had been dealing with it fairly well, all alone as he was. Someone else might no agree, but Sasuke hadn't destroyed himself yet, so Naruto considered him to be a fairly valuable asset.

He undeniably had promise.

Naruto found Uchiha Sasuke hidden under a bush, that at least was better protected then the one Haruno had been crouching under. Jumping down from the tree, branch to branch, until he reached the ground, Naruto settled on the balls of his feet just a shrill scream lit up the forest. It seemed like Haruno had been found. Naruto thought it'd be faster, but apparently Hatake was taking his time to play with them.

Naruto smirked down at the Uchiha. "Found you."

Uchiha scowled up at him and hissed, "Get down, idiot! You're going to lead him straight to us."

Naruto just sat down on the ground in front of Uchiha, as if he had not a worry in the world. "Oh please, he's a jounin. He already knows exactly where we are. He's just toying with us now."

"Maybe he's toying with you." Uchiha retaliated.

Naruto smirked again. "You know what this test is truly about, right?" he questioned and continued when Uchiha just scowled harder at him. "Teamwork. Konoha genin teams are _always_ in units of three. Never more or less. Which means that no matter the result, unless we show we can work as a functional team, we're _all_ going back to the academy."

"And you figured this out how?" Uchiha snapped and stared at him condescendingly. Naruto didn't take it personally.

Naruto just hummed, a carefree sound that didn't fit the occasion. Unsettling people was both useful and fun. "Think about it logically and you'll see it makes sense. Your parents must have told you this at some point, right?"

Uchiha just glared at him in response, but after a few more tense seconds, he crawled out of his hiding place and joined Naruto in sitting on the ground. "So," Uchiha started. "do you actually have a plan or are you just talk?"

Naruto smirked at him with glee and a hint of madness in his eyes. "Oh, I have a plan alright."

He could sense the crushing sense of guilt and self-hatred that made up Hatake approaching them. Naruto was well aware of where he had felt that sensation before. Hatake was either a very dedicated stalker, or he was one of the guards the Hokage had placed on him. Naruto was no fool, as a walking weapon, there was no way he had ever been unsupervised in his life, whether for his own safety or anyone else's.

But of course, considering that they had never so much as shown themselves or helped him out of a tough spot, Naruto had no kind feelings to spare them.

Naruto had no intention of fighting Hatake head on, at this point, that would be suicide. Oh, he was powerful yes, but he didn't have enough skill yet to balance the scales. Moreover, he was of the opinion that ambushing someone was the smart way to go. He didn't care if someone would just call it cowardliness or fear or even dishonorable. Naruto knew well that in the long run, fighting smart would win the war. Pure power wasn't all that mattered, no matter how much people lied to tell themselves it was. And if they truly believed it, they hadn't ever met a genius.

(He might not want to destroy the world anymore, not truly, but that didn't mean that he cared for even a second. Let it burn.)

(The world would be better for it.)

(Humans were such greedy animals and war was just its nature. Such a thing as peace didn't— _couldn't_ —exist, especially not in a world like this.)

(But if he ever got the chance... well he'd lost his chance to do right by his world before. Maybe ruling the world would at least be amusing. And in that case, he knew exactly where to begin. Konoha was the most powerful shinobi village for a reason, after all.)

(Naruto _hated_ being bored.)

Turning back to give Uchiha the details of the plan he had already been working on the night before, he ignored the look of disbelief on the Uchiha's face. He might have acted like an idiot before, but now he was no longer bound by those limitations. He was already an active shinobi and as long as he yelled about how much he loved Konoha a few more times and shoved the public how honest and idiotic he was, he'd be seen as both harmless and loyal.

All the better, really.

He'd hate to betray expectations.

Giving the Uchiha at his side a smile, Naruto let his mind wander briefly. That idea of ruling Konoha just sounded more interesting by the day. Was there anything Konoha would hate more than to have to follow the orders of the jinchuuriki it despised?

If he played it right, he could make it seem like an innocent dream of a young boy that just wanted to be loved. If he played it up enough, he might even manage to get some genuine support too. Enough to make it seem like a legal and justifiable thing.

(The best revenge, after all, was being so firmly above your victims that they lived their whole lives in fear of being utterly crushed. It was having so much power, that they literally couldn't raise a fist towards you.)

Maybe he should start laying the foundations to be the next Hokage. As the son of the Yondaime, he already had a working base to manipulate.

Something nice to look forwards too.


End file.
